Viewer Log: Iron Fist ep 7

Before we get started, I feel it’s important to let you all know something. On my last post, The Scorpion, a fan reached out asking for a guide on how to potentially get into comics, specifically Marvel. I am currently working on this post, but it’s going to be a little while before I get it all finalized. I want to give you, my audience, the best most comprehensive guide that I can produce. But if you can’t wait, the shortest bit of advice I can give is check out Marvel.com. Thank me later. Let’s get to it.

Not the face you want to make when your hand is glowing.

We open to Harold Meachum in his weird sleep pod thing. He’s rudely awaked by a pair of Hand goons. They are because their boss, Madam Gao, had recently learned that Danny Rand is in fact the Iron Fist. Something that troubles her, as Harold went so far as to break his near hermit like isolation to visit Danny in the mental hospital. Harold feints ignorance, claiming he has no idea what the Iron Fist is, or that Danny is it. The goons are debating what Harold’s “punishment” should be, chopping off a finger or his tongue, when Danny bursts in. Worst. Timing. Ever. The two men fight off the goons, and Harold kills them both. He then chops off his own finger, to hopefully fool The Hand into thinking the goons came in, did their job and then died at some point after leaving. I just feel the need to ask, why didn’t the Hand have somebody watching the penthouse from a distance? For this very situation? Whatever, moving on.

With the two younger Meachums, Joy is chastising her brother for his flagrant substance abuse. Something that, again, she’s apparently known about for a while but somehow didn’t come up until like last episode. So bizarre. During their heated debate, Ward gets called up by Harold. He rushes over to the penthouse, and learns that Daddy just wants him to dispose of the bodies. And considering that Ward walked in while Harold was smashing their teeth out, this might actually be the worst timing ever. Because Ward has no backbone when it comes to his Dad, he agrees. He’s rewarded by finding another vial of his pills in the back seat. Hooray? He dumps the bodies, and then checks a bank account. He’s got a couple million dollars in said account… how interesting.

Meanwhile, Colleen stitches up Danny’s wounds from his death match against the Hand. They then share a drink, and Danny gives her a small explanation of his Iron Fist tattoo. The large winged dragon on his chest, FYI. Namely, that being made the Iron Fist increases his strength, and allows him to channel his Chi more effectively. Colleen and Danny then get… better acquainted. It’s a good thing that the Iron Fist doesn’t have to take a vow of celibacy, just saying.

Madam Gao is probably the best part of this series thus far.
She's this little itty bitty old woman that fills me with dread.

The next morning, Danny arrives at his office and asks his secretary to look into all of his father’s files. He’s shaken up by Gao’s claims that she knew Wendel Rand. Joy arrives, grabs Danny, and shows him the statement he’ll give to the board of directors. Basically, it’s a “sorry I spoke out of turn” note. The board meeting completely flies out of Danny’s mind, as Madam Gao herself hobbles into his office. She brought him a bonsai tree, how nice. She gives a few vague hints about her past, how she’s incredibly old and that she’s had dealings with previous Iron Fists. She mentions that despite how long she’s been around, she’s just now seeing a paradigm shift. The devil of hell’s kitchen, the man with unbreakable skin, and now a weapon that left it’s post, these things are unusual, even for Gao. And I guess Jessica Jones is chopped liver. She gives him another ultimatum, namely, stay away from her dealings and enjoy being the head of Rand. She departs and shows off a special ID badge in the elevator.

Danny forces the doors of the elevator open, summons the Iron Fist, and slides down the shaft after them. Madam Gao stops at the 13^th floor of the building, a floor that apparently needs a special pass to access. Danny sneaks in and overhears some of their dealings. The Hand has it’s fingers in a lot of pies, as the saying goes. After Gao departs, Danny assault’s her secretary, and gives the young woman an out. Leave Rand, and New York, and he’ll destroy the Hand so they can’t follow her. Not a terrible deal, really.

While this is going on, Colleen gets a visit from an old friend, someone named Bakudo. Bakudo is some sort of mysterious martial artist, and knows that Danny is the Iron Fist. How odd? And with the Meachums, Joy and Ward reconcile, and Ward is clearly looking to make a break for the Bahamas. Joy is under the impression that he’s going into rehab. Poor trusting girl.

Danny suits up for the board meeting, and is really disappointed about what his secretary was able to dig up about Wendel Ward’s files. She literally was only able to find his old pass. Shoot. At the meeting, Danny tosses out Joy’s note, and reveals his plan. He wants them to shut down the plant, until they know for sure that their Staten Island plant isn’t causing cancer. And that they don’t fire the workers. <Sign> Danny, ask Tony Stark how well this sort of idea goes over with a board of directors. Sort it doesn’t go over well.

Later, he gives Harold all of the data that he got out of Gao’s secretary. They learn that the Hand is using Rand to ship product all over the world, and that their plant is most likely in Brooklyn. Danny grabs Colleen, and then the two get the Ax Gang… I mean the Hatchet men from the previous episode to help them raid the Hand facility. They smash through the place, but are too late to save the Chemist, Radovan. He, with his last few breaths, lets them know that Gao now has his formula for the synthetic heroin, and that she is heading to Anzhou, a city in China. The very city that the Rand family was heading to before their plan crashed. How interesting.

There's heavy handed symbolism, and then there's this
craziness.

Meanwhile, things aren’t going well for the Meachums. Joy is informed by the Board of Directors that after an emergency meeting, she, Ward and Danny are getting ousted from Rand. Now, I have no history in business, but I feel like you can’t kick the majority shareholder off of anything. Correct me if I’m wrong. Ward, meanwhile, tries to head for somewhere warm and sunny, but is informed that his card was declined. And when he checks his account, all the money is gone. He goes to the one man that could have done that. Harold laughs at his son’s fury. Harold informs Ward that he was well aware of Ward embezzling from Rand from the beginning, and furthermore, was the reason that the IRS or the accounting department at Rand never found out about it. He chastises Ward for trying to run, and beats him a few times when Ward claims the last happy day of his life was the day that Harold died. Ward, finally having hit his breaking point, grabs the knife that Harold had used earlier, and stabs his father in the gut repeatedly. He then drags daddy out to the glade again, and buries him with the Hand goons. Well, that was dark.

Honestly, most of the elements in this episode should have appeared in the first half of the season. Danny meeting his opponent, Madam Gao, Rand starting to fall apart after the fall out from Danny’s incompetence, and Ward snapping at his father. Ward has been one of my least favorite characters in this show, but this episode does make up for some of it. Seeing him hit his breaking point, when his pills are gone, his body is barely hanging together, and he’s being asked by Dad again to swallow his pride and be a good boy. Yeah, I can see why he’d stab his daddy. I have no idea what’s going on with that Bakudo guy, other than his name sounds like Bakugo, but he’s much calmer and collected then that Anime psycho. So yeah, this episode is an upswing from some of the rest of the season, and I hope it continues.

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Villain Profile: The Scorpion

Okay, so one more, slight detour before I return to the topic of Danny Rand’s adventures in New York. So, a number of years ago now, I did a theme week of characters that had been bonded to the Venom Symbiote. One of those characters was MacDonald “Mac” Gargan. While Mac is one of the better known, and long running, Venom hosts, he actually got his start much, much earlier in the Spider-Man Mythos, as the monstrous Scorpion. Let’s get to it.

I wonder how much property damage he
causes just scaling buildings.

Way back in the day, Mac Gargan was a sleazy private investigator. One of those guys that had few moral qualms, would do anything for a quick buck. Which made him perfect for a job that everyone’s favorite Spider-Man hater, J. Jonah Jameson, had in mind. See, JJ hates Spider-Man, but prints stories about him in the Daily Bugle because they sell copies. He knows that one of his freelance photographers, Peter Parker, somehow takes really amazing pictures of Spider-Man to use in these stories. And he also knows that Parker is pro-Spider-Man and would never tell someone like Jameson about the details of how he gets said pictures. So, Jameson hired Gargan to follow Parker in the hopes of learning how he takes the pictures in the hopes they could use this information to finally ruin Spider-Man. This of course doesn’t work out the way that they’d hoped, because, you know, Spidey Sense, and Gargan returns to Jameson empty handed. Obviously infuriated by this, Jameson decides to try plan B. He hires Gargan to undergo a highly dangerous and virtually untested genetic procedure. Now, a smarted man would have walked away after the words ‘highly,’ ‘dangerous,’ and ‘untested’ came up in the contract, but Jameson offered him like a $10,000 to do it, so Gargan might not have heard all the details. A geneticist named Dr. Farley Stillwell combined Gargan with the DNA of a Scorpion, as scorpions are one of the spider’s natural predators. He also outfitted Gargan with a costume that came equipped with a large club-like mechanical tail, similar to that which an actual scorpion uses.

The newly dubbed Scorpion sought out Spider-Man and easily dispatched the wall-crawler. Spider-Man slips away, but is quickly tracked down and beaten some more. Spider-Man escaped a second time, which proved most fortuitous for everyone involved. It’s at this point where the side effects of combining human DNA with an arthropods’ DNA proved to be insanely dangerous and stupid. The combination of the scorpion’s natural predatory instincts and, I’m assuming, degeneration from the DNA tinkering, quickly drove Gargan into a homicidal rage. He tried to murder Jameson and Stillwell, but Spider-Man intervened. This time he was able to disarm, or in this case de-tail, Scorpion of his mechanical appendage, and saw that Gargan was put away for his crimes.

Now, despite being one of Peter Parker’s older enemies, and being his original ‘broken mirror’ villain (similar powers to hero but few to no moral restrictions), Gargan hasn’t really done all that much of note. He’s largely a merc villain, working for anyone and everyone that’s willing to pay him for his services. Huh, the more things change… Though, he harbors a special hatred for Jameson and Spider-Man. He’s actually let more than one largely foolproof plan fall apart simply because he wanted to humiliated one or both of the men he hates so intensely. Like the time he started working as a merc for evil billionaire Justin Hammer, who even gave him some suit upgrades for his trouble, which he flushed away when he turned a kidnapping into a hostage situation. All to humiliate JJ. He lost the job and his tech upgrades right after. He also tried to kidnap JJ’s bride-to-be, but was thwarted by Spider-Man, and also tried to attack Spider-Man at a hospital. Spidey’s location had been given to him by another villain, the Jackal. Rather than finding Spider-Man, he just found Peter Parker and Aunt May. He threatens the poor old gal to force Peter to get Spider-Man. After she passes out from the shock of this ordeal, Peter slips away, gets into costume and beats the heck out of Gargan. He then forces the Scorpion to personally apologize to Aunt May.

He really hates being called names.

The Scorpion didn’t really switch into High gear until more recent years, like during the Acts of Vengeance story. A superhero reality TV show lead to an insane exploding villain named Nitro to going off in a suburb, killing hundreds. People were up in arms after this, demanding harsher punishments for super criminals, and for all super-beings to register their powers with the government. Gargan had tried to escape to Canada, but was quickly ‘deported’ by Canada’s… Avengers? X-Men? Their superhuman team Alpha Flight, and the lesser known Gamma Flight. He eventually traveled to Latervia and took up a position as an enforcer for the current Latervian dictator, Lucia von Bardas. He’s taken down by Nick Fury and the Avengers, in an unsanctioned mission into Latervia, and sent to prison. He’s eventually freed by Norman Osborn, whom turns the Scorpion into one of his enforcers. His first job is to essentially ensure that Norman stays out of prison. Namely, after Norman’s most recent arrest, Gargan was tasked with kidnapping Aunt May and forcing Peter to break Norman out of prison. Gobby told Scorpy who’s beneath Spidey’s mask, fyi. And after that snafu, it was then that the Symbiote, having recently ditched its newest host, approached Gargan with an offer.

As mentioned in his Venom post, Gargan spent a few years as Venom, but quickly grew to hate some of the more ghoulish things the suit forced him to do… like eating people. He’s finally freed after Norman, who’d been going nuts once again and used his position as head of the SHIELD replacement HAMMER to waged an all-out war with Asgard, and the rest of their compatriots were arrested. In prison, he’s eventually freed by another Spider-Man baddy, Alistair Smythe, and given a new and improved Scorpion suit. Sometimes it’s best to stick with the part you know, ya know?

Mac Gargan was given similar arachnid-like powers as Spider-Man, thanks to highly dangerous and experimental chemical and radiological treatments. This was included, but not limited to, splicing his DNA with a Scorpion, having him ingest various steroids and more exotic substances, and hitting him with near lethal doses of Radiation. The end result turned him into a hulking brute, with enhanced strength, speed, agility, reflexes, and stamina. He can climb walls, but unlike Spider-Man who adheres to the surface, he uses his claw-like fingers to punch holes into the sides of walls. He wears a cybernetically enhanced battle suit that further enhances his durability and strength, and also gives him a robotic tail. Said tail he uses like a club, but it usually comes equipped with something extra as well, like the ability to shoot acid, poison gas, or darts.

The Scorpion’s biggest weaknesses are his severe anger management issues, and his rather low intelligence. If you can get him mad, which isn’t hard, he starts making a metric ton of mistakes and is actually surprisingly easy to manipulate. His hatred of Spider-Man and J. Jonah Jameson often get him into trouble, as he’ll abandon any plan or turn on pretty much anyone if they try to stop him from getting his revenge. He’s a dumb, dumb, dumb man.

Scorpion is a regularly recurring villain from Spider-Man’s rogues’ gallery. Not quite on the same level as the big three, Venom, Doc Oct, or Green Goblin, but he does appear in most shows. One of the few Spider-Man shows that he didn’t appear in directly was The Spectacular Spider-Man. He was alluded to in the second season finale, and show runners have confirmed that he would have appeared in season 3, had they been renewed.

His latest comic book form.
He's like a green Rhino.

Mac’s origin story was pretty much shown note for note in Spider-Man: The Animated Series from the 90s. In it, Mac began as a fat, neurotic PI that had been hired by JJ to find Spider-Man’s secret identity. After a few failed attempts at getting the dirt, Jonah convinces Gargan to undergo a genetic experiment using a device called the Neogenic Recombinator. The portly little Gargan turns into a giant Spider-Man killing machine, and goes to bring Spider-Man in. He’s stronger, and faster then Parker, being able to catch up to Spider-Man and cut his web-lines mid-swing. He’s able to capture Spider-Man, but then undergoes a much more severe and painful mutation, growing claws, fangs, and scalier green skin. He erroneously believes another dose of radiation could reverse the process, going so far as to make a reactor begin to go nuclear to meet that end. He’s distracted long enough by JJ insulting him for Peter to get the upper hand, knocking Scorpion out and bringing him into custody. After this, he’s mostly seen as part of the Insidious Six, the Fox Kids approved version of the Sinister Six. He appears in the episodes “The Sting of the Scorpion,” “The Insidious Six” parts one and two, “The Final Nightmare” part 2, “Partners” and “The Wedding.”

His most recent appearance was in Spider-Man: Homecoming. In it, rather than a PI, he’s some sort of crime boss. Because subtlety is stupid, he has a sizeable Scorpion shaped tattoo on his neck. He has a deal with the Vulture for several of his exotic weaponry. They meet on the Staten Island Ferry, but their deal is interrupted by Spider-Man, and the FBI. Gargan gets messed up pretty bad in the fight, being hit by a car as the Ferry nearly goes under. In a mid-credit’s scene, we see that Gargan is put into the same prison that Toomes is in. He has heard through the grape vine that Toomes might know who Spider-Man really is, and that he has people on the outside that could use that information to get payback. Adrian denies it though, and their ushered apart. Just got to say, much better way to set up the sequels then the Amazing Spider-Man series. This way, the villain for the sequel really could be anyone, from the Scorpion himself, to any number of lesser mercs, like Kraven the Hunter, or Mysterio.

Hm... wonder if/when he'll done his scorpion
tail?

A version of the Scorpion appears in Ultimate Spider-Man. This version is not Mac Gargan, but a young man trained at K’un-Lun and is a rival of Iron Fist. He betray's Danny and tries to force him from K'un-Lun as he feels Danny is unworthy of the title of Iron Fist, but is thwarted and excommunicated from K'un-Lun after that. That’s about all I have to say on that, as he’s largely a background character from that point onward. This is probably due to the fact that he was played by the rather popular voice actor Dante Basco, whom I'm pretty sure doesn't have all that much free time to be doing largely one off characters. Dante Basco was Prince Zuko in Avatar, Jake Long in American Dragon: Jake Long, as well as Rufio in Hook, if his name doesn't ring a bell. 

A version of the Scorpion is set to appear in Marvel’s Spider-Man, the latest incarnation of Spider-Man to appear on Disney XD. From the trailer I saw, he’s going to be one of the first villains that Spider-Man comes across, as the teen hero is in a much more makeshift costume in the trailer. And that’s all I really know about that particular appearance.

He makes an appearance in one form or another in pretty much all of the Spider-Man games. Just saying.

Huh, I didn’t really realize until I started writing this post just how little Scorpion actually has appeared outside of the comics. He has the two mentioned above, the one promised appearance that never came to fruition, and then two other appearances in older shows that I never saw. Despite this, I know this character reasonably well. He’s your pretty standard ‘wanted powers, but regrets them’ type bad guy. The powers he’s received, while making him one of Spider-Man’s more iconic villains, have left him a monstrous shell of a human that only seems to delight in causing pain and misery. It’s kind of sad when you think about it. Like a lot of more burly villains, he’s on the dumber end of the intelligence spectrum, and because of that hates being talked down to or insulted. One of the lines I remember best from him was in his initial episode when he kept screaming “Stop callin’ me names!” after JJ started laying into him about his insane plan to get a cure. I’m unsure if I’d want to see him appear in the next Spider-Man sequel, or if they should save him for a third movie, but I’m sure he’ll grace the big screen sometime soon. Have a good one everybody.

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https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a8/Scorpion_%28Mac_Gargan%29.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/71/Spidermanep2.jpg
http://imgur.com/gallery/UlRtZ
http://marvelcinematicuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/File:SMH_BtS_Scorpion_2.jpg

Review: Spider-Man: Homecoming

Much like with my Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2 review, I find myself again conflicted. Spider-Man: Homecoming (SMG) is a good movie, but a lot of the minuscule changes does bring me out of it just a little. But, once again, I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s get to it.

Would he really need the headphones?
I feel that Tony would have built some
into the mask.

We start in the beginning. Way in the beginning, just after the Chitauri invaded New York. A local salvage company run by Adrian Toomes was contracted to perform the city’s clean up. Toomes is obviously elated with this turn of events, as the massive damage and tons of Alien tech means a pretty big windfall for him and his company. Unfortunately, things take a turn when their operations are taken over by the U.S. Department of Damage Control (DODC). This new agency, developed in part by Tony Stark, is tasked with this and all future massive clean ups caused by the Avengers or other heroes. Toomes is, to put in nicely, infuriated that he’s been pretty much ruined by government meddling. But, he does have a bit of inspiration. See, his crew still had some Chitauri tech they’ve salvaged but didn’t turn over. His idea? Rip it apart, look it over, and see if they can’t make some improvements. His crew, with few other options, agree.

We flashforward eight years, and see Peter’s trip to fight alongside Team Iron Man during the Civil War. After things had calmed down, Tony drops him off back at his Aunt May’s, leaves him with the Stark Tech Spidey-suit, and promises to call him if anything big happens. Two months later, and absolutely nothing big has happened. We see that Peter has pretty much been obsessing over his ‘Stark Internship,’ as he calls it, and has pretty much reoriented his life around being ready to answer the call. This includes dropping out of most of his after-school programs, and largely tuning out his friend, Ned. He keeps himself busy fighting minor crimes, helping others, and calling Happy Hogan to pester him about the next big mission. Happy was put in charge of looking after Peter’s well-being, FYI. Things start making a turn when he comes across an armed ATM robbery. The robbers are outfitted with super advanced laser cutting tools and some sort of anti-gravity gun. He’s able to stop them, but loses the baddies when he saves a local convenience store owner. He tries to tell Happy about it, but the man is clearly all kinds of done with working as Peter’s liaison. Peter, wrapped up in his thoughts, kind of accidentally reveals his superhero identity to Ned. Really hard to lie to your buddy about being a hero when he sees you literally crawl on the ceiling. Ned spends the next few days grilling Peter about all the nuances of being a hero.

Sometime later, they’re invited to a party thrown by local hottie… is it weird I’m saying that about a teenager? Looking… looking… oh, thank goodness, her actress is 27. She’s a drop dead gorgeous local hottie, then. Why are they at the party? Well, the boys heard that said hottie, Liz, has a crush on Spider-Man. The teens have a half-cocked planned about Peter showing up at the party, then coming in as Spider-Man to show off. He could get some attention from Liz, and get local bully Flash Thompson to shut his trap. They seem to forget the important bit that if Peter’s in costume, drawing attention to Peter not being there, might be detrimental to the whole secret ID thing. Thankfully, Peter’s dumb plan is interrupted by the sight of a few mushroom clouds. Oh, that’s not something to be thankful for.

Michael Keaton is rocking that giant bird suit.

He comes across an arms deal between local screw up Aaron Davis and two of Toomes’ goons. One Herman Schultz, he appears to be Toomes’ right hand man, and Jackson Brice, a trigger-happy idiot that goes by ‘The Shocker.’ Given his usual Alias, this is a major step up for Brice, just saying. Peter stops the deal, and chases the goons across town. He gets close to stopping them, but unfortunately, they called the boss. Toomes suits up and flies in. The Vulture throws Peter around and drops him into the river. He’s saved by Tony, who sends a remote-controlled Iron Man suit to save him. He warns Peter to stay out of this and let Tony and his people handle things, but Parker’s oh so rarely stay out of trouble. On his trek back into town, Peter recovers one of the weapons that was lost in the chase.

Back at the lair, Toomes berates his goons for all the damage they caused, and Brice for showing off the weapons far too openly. He fires Brice, but then Brice lets slip that he may just let slip all he knows about the operation. Toomes turns him into ash. Literally… he thought it was an anti-gravity gun. He takes Brice’s gauntlet from the dust pile, tosses it to Shultz and says he’s the Shocker now.

Peter and Ned look over the weapon, and uncovers the alien power cell within it. They’re nearly found by Schultz, but Peter is able to slip a tracking device onto him. After a few hours waiting, they learn the lair in all the way back in Maryland. Which is quite fortuitous, as the school’s Decathlon team is on their way to DC for the national championship. And guess who used to be their star member? That’s right, Peter Parker. Once in DC, Peter bugs out to chase Toomes’ goons. Beforehand, though, he and Ned disable the suit’s built in tracking device, and disable the ‘Training Wheels’ protocol to give Peter full access to the equipment. He finds Toomes’ crew, and interrupts the big buzzard stealing from a DODC truck. Unfortunately, Toomes’ in his Vulture gear overpowers Peter, and traps him in the DODC truck, and later the DODC facility. Peter misses the decathlon, but learns something very important. That the Chitauri core will turn into a bomb if it’s irradiated. Shoot. He escapes the DODC in the morning, and arrives just in time at the Washington Monument to see the core detonate, threatening Ned, Liz and most of his classmates. A smart-ass gal named Michelle didn’t go on because she didn’t want to celebrate a monument that may or may not have been built by slaves. Smart girl. Peter shows off some acrobatics, and saves everyone in the nick of time.

Why just the one glove?
Shocker always had two before now...

Back in New York, he tracks down screw-up Aaron Davis and convinces him to let Peter know where the next weapon exchange will be. Why? One, Peter willingly offered himself up to protect Davis when the two goons thought the deal might be a set up, and Two, because he’s scared of those weapons and doesn’t want to risk his kid nephew from getting on the business end of one. Hint hint, subtle hint. Where is the next deal taking place? On the Staten Island Ferry with a crime boss named Mac Gargan. Peter charges in, and disrupts the buy, but things get royally screwed up. FBI guys show up and start shooting, Toomes gets in gear and starts blasting, and Peter’s interference causes the ferry to split and start to sink. Peter is able to save the day, due in large part to an assist from Iron Man. Tony is furious at Peter’s recklessness, and demands the suit back. Peter tries to keep it, but Tony isn’t having it.

Peter’s life gets back to normal for a bit. He gets back into school, he and Ned hang out, and he even gets a date to the titular Homecoming dance from Liz. Hooray. Things hit the fan again, though, when he goes to Liz’s for their date. Imagine his terror when Adrian Toomes answers the door. Now, I initially thought he somehow learned about Peter’s identity and threatened his little girlfriend. You know, like every other Spider-Man villain, ever. But no, actually, Adrian Toomes is in fact the last man on earth to threaten Liz. Why? He’s her dad. Oh crap. Peter is obvious tense, but things only get worse when Toomes’ actually uses his brain. I know, it’s totally shocking, isn’t it? He figures out Peter’s ID and none-too-subtly threatens Peter to stay out of his business and show Liz a good time. Unfortunately, Peter can’t bring himself to do it. Especially when he figures out that Toomes’ new plan is. He’s going to rob a Stark Industries’ jet, as it moves the last of the Avenger’s tech to their new facility upstate. So Peter is going up against Vulture, his goon Shocker, and all he’s got is his handmade costume, and Ned as tech support. Shoot.

One of the smallest, but funniest
roles I've seen in a while.

The good first, as always. Stellar cast across the board. Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Jon Favreau, Robert Downey Jr., Marisa Tomei, Donald Glover, the list goes on. I’ll call special attention to Jacob Batalon as Ned, and Zendaya as Michelle Jones. Both steal every flipping scene that they’re in. Jacob especially as he’s in more scenes overall. He’s the tech guy, and just a massive fan boy to Peter form the moment that he finds out his best friend is a superhero. Zendaya, who I swear has at most twenty lines, made me laugh every single time. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. She’s just a delight. The effects are amazing, I especially like the movie design of the Vulture. His giant cleaving wings are stunning. The story is, as I’d hoped, more or less down to earth. Peter, having tasted what the life of a hero could be like, is hungry for more, and chomping at the bit to prove himself. His’ head is in the clouds, but he needs to learn to keep his feet on the ground. Toomes’ arc, while completely not tied into the character he is base on, is relatable. All he wants is to provide for his wife and daughter, regardless of the costs. Very relatable, and not the least bit forced feeling like with Sandman in Spider-Man 3. It’s also funny. Really, really funny. If it’s not a sight gag with Michelle or this random student in a tiger mascot costume, it’s a quip from Peter or Ned. I don’t think I went ten minutes without a minor chuckle. They still haven’t gotten down the “Peter makes jokes during a fight” thing down just yet, but they’re making progress.

The bad is minimal, but definitely there. A lot of the changes in this film feel like they were done simply to be different from the comics and previous movies. Michael Keaton’s Vulture isn’t really the Vulture, he’s Norman Osborn. Think about it, a villain hellbent on getting his way regardless of the costs, flies around on an over-sized and scary machine, and who’s defeat will ruin the life of someone that Peter cares about. Sure, Liz Allen… I mean, Liz Toomes is better looking than Harry Osborn, but they have a lot in common this go around. Tony’s filling in for Uncle Ben, since we can’t have that “great power” line again. And Michelle Jones is soooo Mary Jane Watson that they used the same initials for her nickname. You can’t fool me, an MJ is an MJ. Ned is much the same. They don’t say his last name is Leeds, but he bares resemblance to Ned Leeds, an old school fre-enemy of Peter’s. My understanding is that for both cases they wanted to reference the comics but not be ‘tied down’ by the canon surrounding the two but... come on. I don’t think anyone, that matters anyway, would care if Michelle Jones is the movies Mary Jane, or that Ned might one day find himself in an orange hood astride a glider. Finally, the fights are all a little anti-climactic. Spider-Man vs. Vulture round 1, lasts about fifteen seconds. Just enough to lift him off the ground and dropped into a river. Round 2, some good licks are laid on both sides, but again, over in under a minute. And Round 3 is pretty much Peter dodging Toomes until the buzzard is distracted. Again, a real quick fight. Finally, I find it a little hard to believe that a government agency wouldn’t notice that a sizeable amount of highly dangerous tech is missing. Like, come on, if I was in charge of Damage Control, my guys would be cataloging every nut, screw, and bolt. Just saying. So yeah, problems are minimal, but there.

I love everything about this kid.

Final note, this movie is jam packed with Spider-Man characters. Pretty much everyone with a speaking line is at least loosely tied to a comic book character. Michelle (MJ) Jones, Ned (Maybe) Leeds, Adrian Toomes aka Vulture but basically Norman Osborn, and Liz Allen-Toomes have been mentioned before, but here are a few more. Jackson Brice usually goes by the code name Montana, a rope trick expert and leader of minor villain henchmen for hire the Enforcers. Herman Shultz is recurring merc villain The Shocker. Aaron Davis is Spider-Man anti-hero the Prowler, and he nephew he mentioned has been confirmed to be Miles Morales, a future Spider-Man. Mac Gargan, with his large arthropod tattoo, will more than likely one day don a large battle suit and call himself the Scorpion. Adrian has tech support from Phineas Mason, better known as the Tinkerer, a tech designer and information broker for the Marvel villains. Student news anchorwoman Betty Brant (another of Peter’s former love interests) makes a few appearances. And finally, there is Principle Morita. This isn’t really a reference to a comic character, more a reference within a reference. His actor, Kenneth Choi, had previously played Jim Morita in Captain America: The First Avenger. It’s never said out loud, but, given the WWII era photo on his desk we see at one point, it’s safe to assume that the principle is supposed to be the son, grandson, or possibly great-grandson of the former Howling Commando. Our cup runneth over with minor characters.

This is an A- movie. It has a decent pace, all-star cast, and a good script. While some of the numerous changes might turn off a comic purest, none of them were so horridness as what you find in Fantastic Four (2016). It’s a more lighthearted story, which I think is great for those whom may feel that the latest string of Marvel and DC movies are a little too dark for their tastes. Don’t let the fact that this is another reboot deter you from seeing this, as Spider-Man has finely, truly, come home. At least in this humble nerd’s eyes.  

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Viewer Log: Iron Fist ep 6

Okay, before we get started, we need to have two moments of silence. One for Mrs. Joan Lee, wife of Marvel’s Stan Lee. While she was never directly tied to the company, we can pretty much thank her for all of the characters and stories that have sprung forth from them. As she was the one who encouraged Stan to make heroes and stories on his terms, rather than fall in line with his editor who wanted DC style characters. She was a classy lady, by all accounts, and will be missed.

…

 The second is on a more personal note, as on 7/7/17, my family had to put down our beloved dog Harley. He was fourteen, nearly blind, stone deaf, and seemed to have some kind of arthritis. Despite all this, seeing him get put to sleep was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. It sucks when what you know is the right thing makes your heart and soul ache, doesn’t it?

…

Iron Fist is Iron Pissed.

Okay, now that we’ve gotten the somber stuff out of the way, let’s talk Iron Fist. I’ll start by saying that I have no idea what the director or editor were thinking when they filmed this episode. I don’t know the technical stuff that goes into shooting a scene or anything, but I can say that when the scene is so dark that I can’t even see the characters in places, it’s too damn dark. The only reason I can think of as to why they’d do this is to make it easier to slip in Finn Jones’ stunt double for the fighting. Not a good reason, if that’s the case. Let’s get to it.

The episode opens to Danny meditating. Again. At the same time, a number of assassins are given some sort of summons from the Hand. Each smile and mention that it is ‘finally time.’ Danny ends his mediation by reciting a line from his master, “Doubt leads to Death.”

Ward watches the video again, the one where Danny apologizes for the Rand chemicals giving a woman’s son cancer. He reaches for his pills, but is interrupted by Joy. Joy reveals she had called a team that specializes in crisis response. To help minimize the damage that Danny caused. Joy convinces Ward to dump his pills. He goes to get Danny. Danny has, meanwhile, discovered several warehouses that might hold the Chemist’s daughter. Ward tries to convince Danny to put it off in favor of the crisis response meeting, but Danny won’t listen. Ward goes along in the hope he could force Danny to come back.

They go through four warehouses before they find the trailer that Danny smashed though. Rather than the Heroin that he’d expected, they find the severed head of the goon that failed to stop Danny. In his mouth is another summons this one for Danny. Danny blows off the meeting to accept the challenge. He talks to Colleen and Claire, who are looking after the Chemist. He explains that if he fights and defeats the Hands top assassins, they have to listen to his demands. Claire thinks it’s a bad idea, but can’t think of what else to do. Like calling a hero that she knows, who has had dealings with the Hand. Did she lose Matt Murdock’s number since last year?

His first mistake was thinking a tournament that started
              with a 2 v 1 fight would be honorable.

Danny meets Gao at the area the Hand has prepared. His terms, if he wins, the Hand will hand over the Chemist’s daughter and leave Rand Enterprises alone. Madam Gao’s terms are, if he were to lose but live, he’ll have to keep his nose out of the Hand’s business. His first fight is against a pair of knife wielding weirdos. They slash their hands and form a circle of blood. If Danny falls out of the ring, he loses. Danny fights and defeats them. The next round is against a woman with a spider tattoo. She plays mind games with him, and sticks him with several acupuncture needles tipped with Singing Spider venom. This disorientates him for a moment, but he regains his senses and defeats her too.

The final round is against a guy with a dozen weapons line around the room. They duel, with Danny once again getting the upper hand. But, before he can defeat the fighter, Madam Gao comes back with the Chemist’s daughter. She orders that Danny forfeit or she’ll kill the girl. Despite his own reservations, Danny does the morally right thing by forfeiting. Before leaving, Danny learns that Madam Gao has gone up against a previous Iron Fist, and knew Danny’s father Wendel Rand. He tries to get info from her, but she smacks him around with telekinesis… or something. He leaves the arena, his spirit clearly broken.

Claire, stop acting like the only thing you can do is make
               the situation worse and call Matt Murdock.

Meanwhile, Ward is going through serious withdrawal. He keeps seeing the severed head of the goon he saw earlier. He abruptly leaves the meeting and tries to get new pills. He stops at an Urgent Care and none to subtlety demands more pills. Joy saves him from embarrassing himself.

Colleen and Claire are looking after the Chemist. When his condition worsens, they’re forced him to take to an actual hospital. Unfortunately, the Hand learns about it, and steal him away despite their best efforts. Not good.

            Hm… I have to say, I really wish this first season had taken place in K’un-Lun. We could have seen Danny’s training, the hellish and deeply psychologically damaging events that he had to go through to become the Iron Fist. We could’ve seen the trials, the tribulations, the spirit breaking moments he must have gone through to be this supreme warrior. Instead, we just get Danny spouting snippets of philosophy and have darkly lit Kung Fu fights. Lame. I am also not a fan of how we really only see Finn Jones clearly during the closeups and really easy Kung Fu moves. If I am wrong and Finn Jones actually did all of his stunt work, and that the unclear fight scenes were 100% on the director and other crew, then I am truly sorry. Iron Fist has been difficult to get through, I’m not going to lie. I will thankfully get a small reprieve when I review Spider-Man: Homecoming.
Have a good night everybody.

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